By now I expect everyone who wants to know knows who Hillary Clinton picked to be her running mate. Nevertheless, I doubt most watched their speeches. If you are serious about politics, then you have to know the opposition.

My previous post (here) was about Socialism. The Democratic Party, the party of Thomas Jefferson, now advocates Socialism. What does that mean in practice? Democrats get elected by pitting us against each other.

Who is Tim Kaine? He is a glib, grinning hatemonger. He expertly demonizes his opposition. He pits those he thinks he can persuade to vote for him against those he knows will not.

What qualifications do Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine have to run anything? They don’t, but if they get elected they will give America a pay raise. With whose money? They will tax “the rich”, of course. Under the reign of Barack Obama, have you noticed how much poorer the rich are getting and how much richer the poor are getting?

In his “acceptance” speech yesterday, Kaine even had the nerve to throw in these lines.

FOR ME, THIS DRIVES HOME THE STAKES IN THE SELECTION . NEARLY 2 MILLION MEN AND WOMEN PUT THEIR LIVES ON THE LINE FOR THIS COUNTRY AS ACTIVE DUTY, AS RESERVISTS — THEY DESERVE A COMMANDER IN CHIEF WITH THE EXPERIENCE AND THE TEMPERAMENT TO LEAD. [APPLAUSE]WHAT DOES DONALD TRUMP SAY ABOUT THESE AMERICANS, THE 2 MILLIONS? HE CALLS THEM A DISASTER, AND JUST THIS WEEK, DONALD TRUMP SAID AS PRESIDENT, HE WOULD CONSIDER TURNING AMERICA’S BACK ON OUR DECADE-OLD COMMITMENT TO OUR ALLIES. AND ALL OF YOU REMEMBER MONTHS AGO WHEN HE SAID ABOUT US AND IT CALL THE, JOHN MCCAIN, THAT HE WAS NOT A HERO BECAUSE HE HAD BEEN CAPTURED AND WAS A PRISONER OF WAR, AND HE WANTS TO BE COMMANDER IN CHIEF? WAS SERVICE MEMBERS ARE OUT THERE ON THE FRONT LINES, — WITH SERVICE MEMBERS OUT THERE ON THE FRONTLINES, THIS IS AN OPEN INVITATION FOR VLADIMIR PUTIN TO JUST ROLL ON IN. EVEN A LOT OF REPUBLICANS SAY THAT IS TERRIBLE DANGEROUS. (from here)

Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine just want to turn our military forces into yet another dependent constituency. If we are depending on Clinton to be our commander-in chief, God help us.

John McCain is not a war hero because he was captured. Being captured does not make war heroes. So why is McCain a war hero? What Trump apparently forgot is that even after being tortured McCain refused early release (from here). Nevertheless, McCain’s been playing this card for over 40 years, and Kaine’s just picking up the card hoping he can use Trump’s offhand remark to turn veterans against Trump. Kaine’s interest is identity politics, not actual issues. He almost certainly does not give a damn about the fighting effectiveness of our armed forces. And yes, I know he has a son. So why is Kaine rooting for Hillary Clinton, someone who puts Top Secret information on her own private email server? We spend ten’s of billions trying to protect our secrets, trying to keep our military and intelligence operations secret, and she just sticks stuff out there?

Does Donald Trump think our military forces are a disaster? Would he leave our allies in the lurch? No and no.

Kaine did not say why or when Trump called our military forces a disaster, but eight years under the command of Barack Obama have not been good for our military. That has been a disaster.

Trump’s idea of insisting our allies either pay us or pay for their own troops is hardly equivalent to leaving our allies in the lurch. In fact, coming from the VP pick of Hillary Clinton such an inference is hypocritical.

Before he makes his speech, watch Tim Kaine sitting behind Hillary as she introduces him. You will see a man who is ecstatic. Why? Why did Hillary pick Kaine? She needs a good attack dog. Kaine fits the bill, and he knows it.

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7 thoughts on “HERE IS WHAT TO EXPECT”

Tom, you ask whether we have noticed under President Obama that the rich are getting so much poorer and the poor are getting so much richer.

Actually, I don’t think too many people have noticed that. That’s why Senator Sanders was getting traction with some of his populist rhetoric (and, also, to an extent, Mr. Trump) . Most of the data available does not show a big rise in the low end of the economic spectrum and a big decrease of wealth at the top end, as you seem to have noticed and most of us have missed. The commonly expressed concern has been the opposite – that over the past couple of decades (this is not a one-administration phenomenon) there has been increased stratification and concentration of wealth in an increasingly smaller proportion of the population.

The discussion needs to be whether this is a problem for a democratic Republic, and, if so, how do we address this. Let me be the first to say that I do not favor the central government using the Tax Code as a redistribution mechanism. But I do question your premise that the rich are going down the tubes and the poor of this Nation have gained substantial wealth (aside from the fact that the last eight years have witnessed some economic gains as the economy ploddingly inched its way out of the Great Recession of 2008-9) in the Obama years.

Yes – the recovery has been a slow recovery. That’s why I used the verb “inched”. But it has been a recovery, and most of the marker data are improved over the past eight years (BTW, there is no particular linkage between economic improvement and population growth, these are two independent variables. One can have population growth with declines in economic marker data).

But I wasn’t touting a huge recovery – quite the contrary. I was saying that while there may have been some marginal statistical improvement of conditions for people at the low end of the economic spectrum, those gains are more or less in step with the modest recovery. While at the high end of the economic spectrum, there does appear to be a decided improvement in the economic conditions for the wealthy. With your corrective comment, I think we are in agreement on that.

“I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: as government expands, liberty contracts.” Ronald Reagan.